Happiness is a Little Adventure

Rev Kane in the Antelope Poppy Reserve

 We live in a wonderful world that is full of beauty, charm and adventure. There is no end to the adventures that we can have if only we seek them with our eyes open. ~ Jawaharial Nehru

I have talked about it many times on this blog and in my book, Appalachian Trail Happiness.  I firmly believe that happiness comes through change and the best way to create change is through travel and adventure.  Now I have written many times before about some of my bigger adventures, Hiking the Appalachian Trail, Photographing Polar Bears in Canada, Hiking to Base Camp on Mt. Everest or traveling to Petra in Jordan.  I understand that those types of large-scale adventures are not always possible for any of us.  But I don’t believe that you need to do a large-scale adventure to make change, that a small adventure is enough.

Mt. Unaka on the Appalachian Trail

As I’ve written about in the last few weeks I’ve been a bit out of sorts.  I’ve felt like I haven’t been making progress toward my larger goals.  I have been, there was plenty of evidence to show me that but sometimes, regardless of evidence to the contrary, you just feel stuck.  A lot of it has to do with my lack of patience, something I still need to work on.  Although I have a bigger adventure coming up in a couple of weeks, I needed something.

Mojave Desert in full bloom

So with the desert in full bloom I decided to take a dawn trip to the Antelope Valley Poppy Reserve in Lancaster, CA.  After an early breakfast I got to the reserve around 7AM.  I was happy to get in early on a Friday morning, by time I left four hours later there were cars lined up all the way to the entrance and the parking lots were quickly filling.  There are about eight miles of trails in the reserve and I think I covered all of them, unfortunately without my knee brace on.  But a little knee pain was absolutely worth it for the magnificent beauty that I experienced in the reserve.  I’ve posted some photos and a couple of videos on my Instagram feed at @reverendmichaelkane.  And for your viewing pleasure here are some of the photos I took, including a biplane that came flying over as I was leaving the reserve.

Have a happy day my friends ~ Rev Kane